To see the full scope of the environmental destruction going on in Central America, one need look no further than the Department of Olancho in Honduras. Over the past several decades, Olancho, a 24,000 square-kilometer land and forest reserve, has been decimated by logging, as its forests are cut down and cleared away for commercial agriculture. Unregulated logging has already destroyed half of Olancho's 12 million acres of forests, and the resulting erosion has dried up much of the region's water supply. The fragile Olancho ecosystem, which includes over 500 unique birds, rare rainforest species, and many endangered plant and animals, is in danger of vanishing. And meanwhile, the majority of people in the area receive very little of the wealth derived from the logging—those proceeds go to large landowners, businessmen, and, of course, the corrupt Honduran government—while subsistence farmers have seen their crops ruined by degraded forests and resultant flooding. Whatever the economic benefits of Honduras' industrialization, they have certainly not been shared by all, and few have even stopped to consider whether they are worth plundering Honduras' rich resource base.

But the inhabitants of Olancho aren't just sitting by and waiting for their forests to disappear. One Honduran priest in particular, Father José Andrés Tamayo Cortez, has over the years helped to organize an army of environmental activists to protest the illegal logging—and the government forest policies that enable it—with truly stunning results. In 2003 Tamayo led a 3,000 person "March for Life" that traveled 120 miles to the capital, bringing environmental issues to the national spotlight for the first time in ages. A second "March for Life" in 2004 drew 5,000 people to protest corruption in the government's National Forest Agency, and the marches have inspired activists throughout the country to organize against environmental destruction. Among his demands, Tamayo is calling for a freeze on logging until conservationists can take an audit of the forest and determine how best to preserve Honduras' forests, as well as new policies to enable local communities to benefit from the resources they own.

Activism, of course, is not without its risks. In the years Father Tamayo has spent organizing workers and protesting unregulated logging, he has been subject to death threats, violent assault, and constant harassment. Business interests in the country have a long history of intimidating activists. In 1975 two priests, Colombian Father Ivan Betancourt and US citizen Father Michael Cypher, along with 10 other organizers were murdered after speaking out and organizing against a local land grab. Three members of the Environmental Movement of Olancho were shot and killed in 2003, including a 23-year-old priest. But Tamayo, who is 47, has refused to give in, and his unyielding efforts and wide following have made it impossible for the Honduran government to ignore the grievances of the Olancho community.

Tamayo, a 2005 recipient of the Goldman Prize for environmental activism, recently sat down to talk to Mother Jones about his efforts in Honduras, and the future of the environmental movement in Central America.

Mother Jones: How has commercial logging affected Honduras, and in particular the Department of Olancho?

Father Tamayo: Olancho is the biggest department in the country—it was once the central agricultural region in all of Central America, and in 1980 it was included as part of a land and forest reserve, in response to the looting that was taking place there. Back in 1975, politicians and landowners and foreign companies were trying to takeover the land there; so we organized a march to stop the invasion and the expropriation of Olancho. And during this first march, there were people who were assassinated, possibly by the Honduran military—among them were two priests who were buried in a well so that they would not be found.

Today, what most concerns the inhabitants of the Department—and these are subsistence farmers, families living there for hundreds of years, two hundred years maybe—is the battle over natural resources: minerals, water, and the forests. Illegal logging is destroying what was once a very productive area. And at the same time, there has been an exodus of people from Olancho who have been depending on those natural resources. It used to be that people would immigrate to Olancho because it was still a reserve. But now those people are being dispossessed, evicted, because of the takeover of those lands that they had been depending on.

MJ: Can you explain the government's role in all this?

JT: In an effort to make the expropriation of Olancho a legal action, the government has validated the right to land by transferring it to the Spanish crown. So they said, anyone who has the original title to a land—originally granted by the Spanish Crown—would be given the crown. So you had wealthy landowners, businessmen, owners of logging companies who weren't even living in Olancho coming and saying, "Oh, my great-great-great-grandfather was given a land grant in this region," going to Spain, getting the land grant, and then being given the land by the government. But it's simply a political maneuver to create legality for something that is completely illegitimate. You have people with land, but without land titles. And people without land, but with land titles.

MJ: So the government is basically colluding with logging companies and other industry leaders to expropriate the land. Why is this all done?

JT: The companies are the sponsors, or godfathers you could say, of the government: they finance campaigns, they install their own people into government. Often what they're do with these land grabs is not really distributing among themselves but repaying a favor or responding to a favor that has been done.

What's also worrisome for us is that there's a lot of foreign aid coming in providing investments for rescuing or helping a particular industry or a particular area in Honduras. But often this money ends up in the pocket of government officials. So how it is possible that these international agencies providing aid don't know how to uncover corruption, and just become blind to it? They, too, are complicit.

MJ: Now can you describe the Environmental Movement of Olancho? Who is part of this coalition, and how did it come together?

JT: We started as a grassroots organization—the movement was based the strong experiences of the people living in the region, having lived through events such as climate change and the loss of crops over the years, and we've been reflecting on these issues. People have been thinking about how, despite all this richness in Olancho, there is still so much poverty in the area. That has brought us together. Our members include subsistence farmers, youths, teachers, families. We have helped shape this into a movement that is located in Olancho, but has also become a movement that has influenced the entire country. This is not a local struggle we are engaged in. So we have taken action, as with the march we did called the "March for Life," which was a political action. We have people with training, who are educated, who go around organizing communities, and to bolster the efforts of communities to organize themselves.

MJ: This training and organizing, how do you prepare people to organize and fight for their land?

JT: The majority of people who we work with live directly off the land. No one has a steady job, no one is employed. Their life is like this: on the days they work, they are able to eat; on the days they can't work, they don't eat. So there are three concepts which we communicate to them. One, everything that you see around you where you live, this belongs to you, this is yours. Second, we explain to them their rights. Third, we communicate the idea that the day that you lose these things which belong to you, you will be worse off, more poor. The community consists of people who range from poor to indigent, that is the range. So on the day that they lose even the small resources that they have, that is the day their death is prepared.

MJ: Now how did you come to be involved personally in this movement?

JT: I'm a priest, but I'm more a priest who celebrates life rather than celebrates mass. I've been living among the people—as they say, I've come down from the mountain, down to the city. And I want to share with you that many of these things, the vestments, they spook me. I feel like a stranger with those things. But I've come to the idea that I've had to express or describe the things that are going on right now, in this world. That's what carried me, and I feel happy with the people of Olancho, because I feel that I'm part of this community, that I'm responsive for them. And I know that our struggle for liberation has to come from the community. So this keeps me centered, grounded, strong. To this day, no one has been able to come and subordinate me, no one has been able to make be quiet, pay me off, bribe me, change my mind, corrupt me. I've been faithful to the people and faithful to God.

MJ: How would you say religion has influenced this movement?

JT: Being a priest has meant that I have this already-assumed acceptance among the grassroots community. Although, at the same time it brings various accusations from the people who oppose us, from the people who we are struggling against...

MJ: Now after the 2003 "March for Life" campaign, you met with the Honduran president, how did that go, what came out of that meeting?

JT: The government likes to talk, but it's mostly just to clean their hands and make it look like they're doing something. After the first march, they didn't even talk to us. After the second march, in 2004, they wanted to meet us then but really just to placate the population. So we decided we didn't want to meet with them because we knew their strategy. We haven't really achieved substantial changes yet. But the government's afraid of our organization now that we have a little more standing. We can turn out a lot of people, and we're getting international attention. We've brought the logging issues to the table, at least. And the government is using the law, their role as the government, to attack and repress what we're trying to do. But we're resisting.

MJ: There have been attacks, death threats, even assassinations against protestors and community leaders. Has the government cracked down on any of this?

JT: No. To the contrary, in fact. For example, when we're taking action and protesting they militarize the region we're in. There's a legal persecution going on, especially against our leaders, to block our actions. There have been assassinations of leaders, and you can say that the businesses do it or the government does it, but really it's the same... When we go out to do a march, the government comes in to block it, but when there's actually an assassination, the government doesn't do anything to investigate it.

MJ: In your view, what should the Honduran government be doing to change its logging policies?

JT: First, monitoring. They have to do an internal restructuring in the government—reorganizing who's in charge of things, who's doing the purchasing—to make it more transparent, less corrupt. Second, the businesses are inserting their own demands in the laws governing the land and resources, but the law should be taking in account the people's needs and criticisms. In the short term the government needs to stop seizing these resources. But the internal restructuring of the government is so important, but it's hard, the government is so corrupt, there's so much robbing going on. In 1995 they created the Honduran Corporation for Forest Development to manage the forests, but they've become part of the problem. The ones who are supposed to be vigilant are the same people that are part of the whole process.

Up in North America, too, other countries need to stop taking advantage of these resources. It's not just an issue down in Honduras—you have to stop the demand as well as the supply. 80 percent of the forests are cut down illegally, and if they're being exported.... Other countries also shouldn't being helping with loans to finance these illegal logging projects.

MJ: Are you seeing much of an international response to your efforts?

There are grassroots nonprofits that support us. We've had meetings with the Department of State, the EU, the World Bank. But many officials just tell us, "We know we have to reduce poverty, we know about the environment, we're doing something, you just have to go slowly. You can't attack the government." That's the expression that officials use. I see a lot of goodwill and movement forward in the NGOs. In fact, there's something very curious—during our second "March for Life" in 2004, for example, the Honduran government made a law so that foreigners couldn't accompany us on the march. They investigated foreigners that were involved in the march. So they're worried about this growing.

MJ: What are your plans for continuing to call attention to deforestation and other environmental disasters in the region?

JT: One of the big projects we're working on is a march called the "Continental March", stretching from Panama to Mexico. To protest the extraction of resources. To protest the privatization of services—electricity, water, education all privatized. How is someone going to have access to that if it's privatized? The subsistence farmers don't have enough money to pay for food. To protest CAFTA. In the whole region, the Central American governments have already approved CAFTA—they're just waiting for the United States to approve it in Congress. But it's an under the table business down here, everything happening without consulting the people. So the people want to rise up and they want to do something strong, to have impact.

At this point, we have credibility. We've created a movement. The businesses want to destroy us, but we've resisted until this point. The question, though, is how long can we resist? Because one day it's possible that the people will get tired, and will prefer to look for food than fight for the cause. That's why we need to create a movement that's moving forward but also gaining strength, not only in numbers but in strategy. That's what I'm most interested in.

Thanks to the Sierra Club for translation help.

FOREST FIGHT THE NEXT COSTA RICA? ENVIRONMENTAL ACTIVISM TAKES ROOT IN HONDURAS By Tina Butler, mongabay.com April 18, 2005

Honduran priest, Father Andres Jose Tamayo, did not set out to be the country's leading environmental activist, recipient of countless death threats and an all-purpose, non-violent crusader against the wholesale destruction of his parishioners' community and livelihood—but he is. Compelled from out behind the pulpit and into action, Tamayo is viewed as the new face of the country's changing attitude about the treatment of the environment. The priest's obvious initial role was to provide religious guidance and counsel to the people of Salama, but he soon found the majority of the community's woes stemmed from recent changes in the environment. Rapid deforestation and the subsequent general environmental degradation in the area were resulting in failing crops, due mainly to limited and polluted water supplies. Precious topsoil was being lost to erosion as the trees' root networks that normally provided natural anchors for soil were no longer in place. And while regular precipitation has become increasingly scarce, when rains do come, runoff of the thinned soil deposits sediment into the water supply, ruining it. All the symptoms of deforestation in this rural, agrarian province of Olancho were resulting in the classic, heartbreaking side effects. Tamayo saw no choice but to get involved and address the problems faced by members of his community head on. During his tenure in Salama, Tamayo has created an army of environmental activists comprised of residents who feel they have nothing more to lose in following him; all of their traditional means of livelihood, namely their crops, have been compromised or destroyed by the degraded forests and resultant agricultural failures.

Olancho serves as a disturbingly representative model for the whole of Honduras, a country where at least half the forests have been eliminated due to various activities including fuelwood collection, timber harvesting, clearing for cattle pasture, and commercial and subsistence agriculture. Deforestation occurs at the alarming rate of over 252,400 acres (102,200 hectares) per year and the majority of the population sees little of the wealth derived from Honduras's rich but increasingly plundered natural resource base.

Tamayo's desire to defend what remains of Honduras's forests as well as the well being of his people is fierce and he is not one to compromise. It is his all or nothing attitude that has nurtured the rampant hostility from the logging companies and his failures to get protective legislation passed by the Honduran government. The priest wants to halt logging in Olancho for ten years so that a comprehensive audit of the forest may be performed and an inventory of biodiversity recorded. He wants to ensure that a complete picture of the present state of the forest is captured so that the appropriate conservationist recommendations and actions will be taken and followed. Tamayo's other main concern is that the local communities will benefit from the profits of their resources, as opposed to outside businesses. Both the government and higher-ups in Tamayo's church are against a complete freezing of logging activity, fearing destabilization of both the economic and social persuasions. So currently, an entirely unofficial moratorium is enforced in Olancho, with the employment of guerilla-esque tactics of blocking roads, bridges and permit-legit logging teams whenever and wherever they occur.

Outside of Salama, Tamayo has been active on a much larger scale. In June 2003, he organized and led the 7-day Marcha Por La Vida (March for Life) to the capital to propose his demands for the freeze and meet with the president, Ricardo Maduro. Starting with 2500 participants, Tamayo arrived in Tegucigalpa 40,000 strong, but Maduro did not meet with him. For his part, the President does show interest in working toward a brighter environmental future for Honduras, trying to impose more logging controls through new forestry legislation, but he cannot get Tamayo behind him without backing the moratorium. The short term economic cost from the freeze is a valid concern for Maduro and his country, but nearly as profound a cost as the environmental degradation and an ultimate fate of no trees and no profitable resources. Trees are the livelihood, but there is a painfully finite end to that supply.

While his followers revere Tamayo, he is reviled by those in the powerful anti-logging and timber industries he seeks to subvert. Numerous threats have been made on the priest's life as well as on those of his comrades—three members of Tamayo's Movement of Olancho (MAO) have been shot and killed, including a 23 year old priest, Carlos Arturo Reyes, shot in his own backyard on July 18, 2003. Sadly, an Amnesty International Urgent Action alert had been issued for Tamayo and his followers just a few weeks prior to the killing. The perpetrators of these actions are likely members of the notorious "logging mafias" and it is unlikely that these occurrences will come to an end. Reportedly, there is a list allegedly drawn up by sawmill owners in Olancho of potential targeted environmentalists. Tamayo remains unfazed by and baldly candid about these very real dangers posed those who resist his fight to save the forests. The mission statement of his Marcha Por La Vida in June 2003 affirms the following; "Something new and noteworthy has been born in Olancho, a feeling capable of uniting the voices of non-violent resistance for life. And this means that in the face of chainsaws and trucks, no longer will anyone stay quiet, even if we have to give up our lives to those who stand in our way." Conversely, the mayor of Salama, Jose Ramon Lobo, a man Tamayo has clashed with on the economic issues tied to his anti-logging stance, made the following remarks in May of that same year, "the environmental problems in Olancho will only be resolved by ordering the killing of Father Tamayo." The priest recognizes the highly political repercussions of his actions from an economic standpoint and anticipates the threats from various parties. Since his incumbency as unofficial head environmentalist cum logging eradicator began, the town sawmill and four woodworking factories have shut down. As a result, over one hundred jobs have been lost and the crime rate is rising. For a small town, the aftershocks run deep. Tamayo is not blind to these things, but holds to his convictions that the short-term economic downturn is nothing in comparison to the long-term effects of deforestation in the region, with resultant problems such as continually failing crops, increasing aridity and a growing exodus of people to urban areas in Honduras as well as the United States. The land can no longer support the people.

Members of the logging industry and the mayor of Salama alike argue that aridity and the drought problems of the past few years are natural effects of cyclical weather patterns as well as part of the broader phenomenon of global warming and claim to be beyond control and influence of the current environmental state. But the nearby hamlet of Jimasque presents dismal evidence that debunks this logic. In this small town of 500 inhabitants, water has to be brought in from a mountain spring fifteen miles away because of water table depletion. Eight years ago, the nearby Agua Caliente River was full of bass and surround by healthy, lush pine forests. Today, there are no fish, the hills are bare and the river is a mere trickle when it does actually run.

A brief history of recent Honduran government activity demonstrates a promising direction for the country, despite current conflict and environmental problems. In 1993, the government passed its first environmental law, and in 1995, the government created a new position of environmental attorney general to help regulate development and resources, currently held by Aldo Santos. Organizations and initiatives have been created such as PLANFOR, the ten-year (1996-2014) forestry action plan and COHDEFOR, the Honduran Forest Development Corporation, both of which play critical roles in shaping the environmental future. COHDEFOR has designed numerous forest management plans for different companies under PLANFOR and reaped unanticipated and impressive profits. In July of 1997, the organization donated five million lempira to the Indian land title program via President Carlos Reina.

While this historic and gesture seemed generous and groundbreaking, it is difficult to avoid questioning whether the politically problematic and inconsistent president was not simply capitalizing on a PR opportunity or some kind of damage control. Giving back land rights to the original inhabitants has to be a good thing, but some numbers are troubling. According to James Gollin, a writer for planeta.com, in 1995, sawmills cut only 800,000 cubic meters of lumber, while machete-wielding campesinos cut six million. Further, while these organizations have hopefully only the best of intentions for the environment, some problematic methods have been recommended. COHDEFOR, recognizing the need for reforestation, has proposed the introduction of fast-growing "exotic" trees like eucalyptus instead of native, and typically slow growing tropical hardwoods, which experts argue would interfere with the indigenous environment and natural balance of native species. Like the creation of jobs versus the preservation of forests, this solution is not without conflict and fallout. With a passionate crusader for the environment and the people who need their habitat intact to survive and a progressive president, regardless of their positive or negative reception, Honduras seems poised to make some profound changes in the next few years. Ideally, the country will follow a path similar to Costa Rica, and realize there is much more money to be made cutting a trail through the forest than cutting all the trees down. Ecotourism, with its own set of intrinsic problems aside, is the best possible outcome for Honduras's environmental and economic future. Under Tamayo's aggressive yet visionary influence, and perhaps with some serious compromise on the part of the Honduran government, the people of Salama and greater Olancho might live to see a restored land and a bright future.

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